DoubleKiller

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Quick Specs

Publisher's Description

DoubleKiller searches for duplicate files by comparing any combination of name, size, modification date, and content. You can exclude files or limit the scan to files matching masks like *.MP3, files in a particular file size range or files with certain attributes, like hidden or system files. When the scan is finished a list containing all duplicates found is displayed and you can manually or automatically select the files to be removed. The result list can be sorted and exported to a textfile readable by both humans and spreadsheet applications. DoubleKiller is a stand-alone executable that does not need to be installed, just extracted and run, and does not alter the system in any way without the user's prior permission.

Works as advertised, finds duplicates by CRC signature so you can delete them, so it is great to help free your disk of redundant files, especially those large videos and pictures you have copies of under different names and that take up so much space.

Cons

Very sow and difficult to work with for large sets of files or large files. Can take hours to scan, which cannot be stopped then resumed. Scan results can't be saved for later use.

Summary

A great program for checking duplicates when you've moved files and renamed them, especaily pictures and videos that you've renamed from what the camera named them as. Just don't you try to look for duplicates all over your hard drive, as it will take forever to scan and you just can't stop the process while it has started without losing all the work it has done to that point.

Furthermore, when a scan discovers over thousands of duplicates, it's simply impossible to remove them manually in one sitting so you essentially have limit yourself to the largest ones for best savings and forget about the thousands of smaller ones which are impossible to sift through in one session; you'll just have to rescan it all over again next time.

With an option to save the scan results and the file selection for further use it would usable for working with backup drives, but as it stands, it's useless for that.

I had something around 8000 to 10000 actual original photos with a collection of around 30,000 counting duplicates. After I deleted all the duplicates, I had 78,899 pictures. I immediately uninstalled the junk. Needs a ZERO star rating

Summary

This has been perhaps the least effective file duplicate finder I have ever encountered. It seemed to find the approximate number of original files that I thought I had and seemed to find approximately the same number of duplicates as I thought I had, but that was the end of the world. When it finally, after several hours, "removed all the duplicates" I had 78,899 pictures remaining. Near triple the total original number counting the original and duplicates. Didn't take but one sampling for mt to remove this application. Wish I could find a duplicate file finder that would function as advertised. Double Killer failed miserably.

Very fast, allows file type exclusions, mask inclusions, attribute and min/max size exclusions. Only bothers to do CRC on identically sized (or named, etc)files (why bother otherwise, but I've seen other software that is a complete WASTE of time by doing a hash/checksum on EVERY file). Nice Delete/move interface.

Cons

Grrr... Isn't able to read file sizes above 2 GiB. That's where it'd clear up space the fastest. C'mon add support for LFS - none of the 32bit crud. Almost everything's on NTFS these days.

Would also be handy if it listed "similar" files (identical name / size / dates as specified), and allowed you to exempt files prior to running the CRC.

Installation failed. FAQ link probided did not work. E-mail link to report error did not work. Log that was supposed to be sent with error report was blank. Not a good program if it can't be installed.

No installation needed. Works from any drive, even USB's. Processed a large number of files quickly. Can be installed in one location & pointed to any other drive or folder. Choices on how you want to delete batches, including Automatically.

Cons

It's not for dummies. No warnings if you are about to do something that will cause harm to your system, which is easy to do. The Menu Options for searching and deleting are limitied but, hey its FREE.

Summary

I used in folders with over 2,500 files and it didn't choke or bog down. It's easy to compare supposed duplicate files attributes to decide yourself if they really are duplicates. But you have to pay attention and read the screen carefully so you know exacltly what it is you are about to do with your files, esp in batch modes.

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